The Human Torch:Blizzard functions separately from Activision. Any and all decisions relating to the game's design is solely on Blizzard's part.

Lol I'm surprised that anyone still buys that shit. They're owned by Activision. They answer to Activision's shareholders. So of course Activision is going to have a voice in what they do. Anyone telling you otherwise, Blizzard included, is pure PR speak.

Activision owns Vivendi Universal, which in turn owns Blizzard. Every company always answers to their shareholders, but the final say is always with Blizzard. Does this mean that they don't get some advice from Activision's financial department? Of course not, but Blizzard has the final say.

All that I am saying that Blizzard is not the holy angel who's getting his wings smeared over with black, corrupt oil by Activision. They have made plenty of dubious decisions even before Activision came into the picture.

Ok, I was on the verge of ripping Blizzard a proverbial new one once I read about the in game auction house.Pay to win ? REALLY ??

I didn't like it one little bit, but I think the model could be altered in some ways to give people EXACTLY what they want.

-Have a Singleplayer mode. Constant authentification should be necessary for Public games and anything that involves the auction system yes, but if somebody can't have a permanent internet connection, they should be allowed to play a private game at home.-I understand that they don't WANT to provide a lan mode because of potential piracy issues, but the system should be designed that people at a lan party can play the game without immense lag.-Enable Mods for private sessions.The clear destinction between public and private games beeing that private characters wouldn't be able to play in public sessions and couldn't use certain features like auction houses etc.

In essence: just recreate the same system of Diablo2.I know that enabling modding is a big investment, but It would be hugely benefitial to the lifetime of the game. The majority of the modders would propably be willing to wait for the implementation of such a feature after release.

Also, I figured that for the majority of my Diablo 2 experience - I haven't given a damn about random players online. I play it with my friends at home or over the internet, so unless I could actually make money from it by dropping some items in it from time to time, I wouldn't have any reasons to be bothered by them.

I'll still wait for the initial oppinions before I buy the game though. Ususally, I'ld have no hesitations about shelling out 50-60€ for a Blizzard title, as I always felt I got a really good game for my money. This time, I'ld rather see and wait.

So they removed the talent tree where you only focused on 3-4 skills and only used where the others were for synergies? You really want that back instead of having everything and six skills you can swap out on the fly?

I have no words to describe the amount of rose tinted glasses nostalgia BS and lack of common sense this thread has.

Have any of you played D2 recently? The rune system has tons more build variety than the old D2 skilltree, at least if you wanted to get past normal mode.

No mods - that sucks, agreed.

No offline - Hello there. In case you were living under a rock, there's this shiny game with a Blizzard stamp called SC 2. Guess what? It works pretty much THE SAME WAY. You really expected otherwise? Really?

Auction House - It was always there before, it's just legal now. I'm curious how it turns out.Also, if you want to gather items on your own, don't use it. If you whine about PvP balance, you're one of the few crazy people that play Diablo for PvP. Sorry but that's a total minority right there, no one cares. If people want to "Pay to win and own Baal in 2 seconds" it's their choice. No one forces you to use the system, no one forces you to play with them either. Get off your high horse.

Oh it is 'Cool' to hate on things Popular. Blizzard is Very Popular. So is Activision. Therefore, popular is bad and any game that must come from either developer will be bad. All because it is the popular thing to do.

Here we have someone who is woefully unfamiliar with the trajectory of corporate America. It's all about the sales. Depth is the enemy of mass appeal. If something appears obtuse or confusing, even temporarily, the never-ending quest for profit demands it be "fixed".

As an experienced gamer for going on 15 years, I don't need to have my shit dumbed down. I'm not a fucking soccer mom. I'm not the elderly. I'm not 8. When companies start catering to those other groups and stop giving two cents about me, I stop supporting them. I also rip them, because I'm free to do so. Then I take my dollars elsewhere (Torchlight 2).

As far as I can tell they are just a bunch of fuckin' morons. However that is just me, they have yet to play it and are just bitching just to bitch. A normal mind would say 'Wait until the game has been released before using any Judgement or hatred upon the game' however that is called the brain. Most don't seem to have them nowadays.

This point is very fair. We shouldn't pass firm judgment on a game before we play it. I think it's sensible to voice concerns about certain aspects of its direction in a reasonable manner, though. I also think the inclusions of "always online" and "microtransactions" are sufficiently incendiary as to warrant outright disdain.

Anyways, I'll say what I said in all of the DA2 hate threads whenever someone decided to paint us as a bunch of, well, haters: monolithic publishers are consistently pushing games to be more accessible, more casual, more simplistic because that is how they maximize profits. This approach doesn't necessarily create better games. Just more profitable ones. If there's no "push back" from experienced gamers demanding more depth and complexity, there's no reason for these publishers to cater to any other demographic. That's a bad thing.

In the case of DA2, the hate clearly impacted sales very negatively. Figures show that it barely sold 2 million copies, 1.5 million fewer than the original. That's what happens when a) you cut a bunch of corners, and (crucially) b) the players call you out on it in a very public manner. We all know Diablo 3 will sell just fine and make a ton of money for Blizzard and Activision, but I'm betting some of their decisions will also positively impact Torchlight 2 sales.

I hope all rage and "preorder" cancelling keeps going until release. By then, the player base will be refined down to a nice, pleasent bunch of people who don't give a crap about all the meaningless things everyone else is getting their knickers in a twist over, and will just want to have fun playing the game solo or with other people. The less whiners the better.

The advertised PvP aspect of the game? Well, it just went to hell and snug itself between devils buttcheeks. You can't have competitive PvP if You "buy power" through RMT. Diablo is not and never was a game of skill, it's game of gear. Want to win in PvP - shell out few hundreds bucks. Hurray.

I don't really want to get into this petty shit-storm, but I do want to comment on this because I'm seeing it a lot.

Blizzard has said since they first started talking about D3's PvP that is NOT going to be "competitive." They said it's never going to be "balanced" and they have absolutely no desires to make it into an "esport." Anyone who's been dreaming of climbing through the ranks of any "competitive Diablo 3 PvP scene" was kidding themselves; it's not going to be anything more than a sidegame put in for when people decide they'd rather kill each other than play co-op in a co-op game (which is how Blizzard has always described Diablo 3, which is also why they disabled the ability to go hostile in the first place).

I don't know, the original didn't have a great deal of replay value, but it was a surprisingly polished and functional hack'n'slasher in the post Diablo 2 generation - not as good as Titan Quest, but certainly better than any of the Dungeon Siege games (ugh). Particularly good considering the devs are basically just indie. Having said that, Torchlight II could be better because most of the things that didn't convince me to play the game through any more than once (no multiplayer, few character choices, samey skills) are things they're apparently addressing in the expansion, so put that on top of an already solid game and you have something that could be more than just decent. The thing is, previously I thought they were being ambitious trying to compete with Diablo III, but Blizzard, benevolent and all-knowing gods that they are, have been kind enough to create them an entire market for a Diablo clone that DOESN'T have real-money trading, DOESN'T forbid LAN or offline singleplayer, and (I could be wrong about this) DOESN'T give the modding community a giant middle finger.

WabbitTwacks:I don't understand the whining. The auction house is optional and this game will have more active skills than D2. so what's the big deal?

Oh it is 'Cool' to hate on things Popular. Blizzard is Very Popular. So is Activision. Therefore, popular is bad and any game that must come from either developer will be bad. All because it is the popular thing to do.

As far as I can tell they are just a bunch of fuckin' morons. However that is just me, they have yet to play it and are just bitching just to bitch. A normal mind would say 'Wait until the game has been released before using any Judgement or hatred upon the game' however that is called the brain. Most don't seem to have them nowadays.

Let me get two things straight.

1. Is information that is released about any given game not to be judged? Is everyone supposed to like it or fuck off?

2. Is "they hate it 'cause it's popular" the best thing you could come up with? Because if it is, I have to say, it doesn't reflect on your level of intelligence all that positively. And neither do the uncalled for insults, by the way.

Alright, let me pull apart your post:

Hammeroj:it doesn't reflect on your level of intelligence all that positively.

Oh an Insult. Well at least you pulled it off before the very end.

Hammeroj:1. Is information that is released about any given game not to be judged? Is everyone supposed to like it or fuck off?

It is to be judged, the point I was TRYING to make (which I cleared up a lot in my second post on the thread if you would have scrolled down) was that don't say the game will absolutely suck (Not opinion, fact as many people make it, much like saying "WoW Sucks!" or "CoD is Stupid!" Instead of the better way of saying "I don't think WoW is all that good". They make it seem like an absolute fact.) especially when you, the poster has not even tried the game. (Poster as in whoever says it in that regard)

In layman's terms: If you haven't tried it don't say with absolute fact that it will suck.

Now on to point two... sorta:

Hammeroj: 2. Is "they hate it 'cause it's popular" the best thing you could come up with? Because if it is, I have to say, it doesn't reflect on your level of intelligence all that positively. And neither do the uncalled for insults, by the way.

The "Popular" was merely a Jest, if you payed any attention to the Escapist community, you would have noticed that CoD and WoW are mainly hated because it is "Popular" (Please note the Quotation marks). It was simply a jest, why you must take it seriously is beyond me.

And then you insult me, you were oh so close to actually making me care about your post, however the insult was rather unwarranted.

Oh it is 'Cool' to hate on things Popular. Blizzard is Very Popular. So is Activision. Therefore, popular is bad and any game that must come from either developer will be bad. All because it is the popular thing to do.

Here we have someone who is woefully unfamiliar with the trajectory of corporate America. It's all about the sales. Depth is the enemy of mass appeal. If something appears obtuse or confusing, even temporarily, the never-ending quest for profit demands it be "fixed".

Trainwreck, that whole paragraph was just a simple jest on the Escapist Community (A simple jab at all the threads exclaiming "I Hate CoD!" When, with further analasis, shows they have never played the game, they are just going with the crowd and saying "I hate [Game Name Here]!").

From the moment I decide to fork cash over for a new game instead of illegally cracking it and downloading it, like the majority of people do this days, Blizzard thinks it's a good idea to chain me down by having me be online all the time to play.

How is that logic?

The game sounds really really good and I liked Diablo II and SOD but why do I have to be online all the time to play? DRM is becoming a nuisance TO THE WRONG CROWD! Like James said, DRM only lasts about a week after the game is released. IF that.

Also, I do not know a lot about the Auction House, but if it equips people willing to pay with better weapons than the ones who can't or are unwilling to pay, then that is simply not fair.

Oh it is 'Cool' to hate on things Popular. Blizzard is Very Popular. So is Activision. Therefore, popular is bad and any game that must come from either developer will be bad. All because it is the popular thing to do.

Here we have someone who is woefully unfamiliar with the trajectory of corporate America. It's all about the sales. Depth is the enemy of mass appeal. If something appears obtuse or confusing, even temporarily, the never-ending quest for profit demands it be "fixed".

Trainwreck, that whole paragraph was just a simple jest on the Escapist Community (A simple jab at all the threads exclaiming "I Hate CoD!" When, with further analasis, shows they have never played the game, they are just going with the crowd and saying "I hate [Game Name Here]!").

Noone was acting like that in this thread. Your arguments hold no water here at all because of that simple fact and you insulted anyone in the thread who didn't like the game based off what we know. All you've done is filled this thread with replies against people, all of which had nothing to do with whatever the hell it is your talking about

Take that argument to a thread like the one you listed and not to one with legitimate complaints about the DRM, no mods and the real cash auction house.

The advertised PvP aspect of the game? Well, it just went to hell and snug itself between devils buttcheeks. You can't have competitive PvP if You "buy power" through RMT. Diablo is not and never was a game of skill, it's game of gear. Want to win in PvP - shell out few hundreds bucks. Hurray.

I don't really want to get into this petty shit-storm, but I do want to comment on this because I'm seeing it a lot.

Blizzard has said since they first started talking about D3's PvP that is NOT going to be "competitive." They said it's never going to be "balanced" and they have absolutely no desires to make it into an "esport." Anyone who's been dreaming of climbing through the ranks of any "competitive Diablo 3 PvP scene" was kidding themselves; it's not going to be anything more than a sidegame put in for when people decide they'd rather kill each other than play co-op in a co-op game (which is how Blizzard has always described Diablo 3, which is also why they disabled the ability to go hostile in the first place).

Took the words right out of my mouth. Kudos!

The PvP was just added by popular demand. Feeling like a pro winning a D3 duel will be something reserved for trolls and ragekiddos (and idiots ofc ;D )

Here we have someone who is woefully unfamiliar with the trajectory of corporate America. It's all about the sales. Depth is the enemy of mass appeal. If something appears obtuse or confusing, even temporarily, the never-ending quest for profit demands it be "fixed".

Trainwreck, that whole paragraph was just a simple jest on the Escapist Community (A simple jab at all the threads exclaiming "I Hate CoD!" When, with further analasis, shows they have never played the game, they are just going with the crowd and saying "I hate [Game Name Here]!").

Noone was acting like that in this thread. Your arguments hold no water here at all because of that simple fact and you insulted anyone in the thread who didn't like the game based off what we know. All you've done is filled this thread with replies against people, all of which had nothing to do with whatever the hell it is your talking about

Take that argument to a thread like the one you listed and not to one with legitimate complaints about the DRM, no mods and the real cash auction house.

You don't know how to read do you? The entire first page (Which was when I had my 2 posts) were full of OMG NOW I WON'T BUY THE GAME. THIS GAME SUCKS. Also, you are indeed new to this whole Escapist, so I will point this out to you:

Each and every day, sometimes multiple there will be threads about CoD and WoW, people will go in that thread and say I HATE THIS GAME IT SUCKS, making it an absolute fact and not an Opinion. An Opinion is when they say they think the game isn't good, not going around spouting it sucks as an absolute factoid. Also, I didn't insult anyone, read my second post on the first page (which you obviously didn't.)

So instead of posting more UMADBRO (Are you mad... bro?) and further derailing of the thread, stop quoting me and actually post more on the topic at hand: What do you think about the Diablo 3 hands On?

The Human Torch:Blizzard functions separately from Activision. Any and all decisions relating to the game's design is solely on Blizzard's part.

Lol I'm surprised that anyone still buys that shit. They're owned by Activision. They answer to Activision's shareholders. So of course Activision is going to have a voice in what they do. Anyone telling you otherwise, Blizzard included, is pure PR speak.

Activision owns Vivendi Universal, which in turn owns Blizzard. Every company always answers to their shareholders, but the final say is always with Blizzard. Does this mean that they don't get some advice from Activision's financial department? Of course not, but Blizzard has the final say.

All that I am saying that Blizzard is not the holy angel who's getting his wings smeared over with black, corrupt oil by Activision. They have made plenty of dubious decisions even before Activision came into the picture.

Wrong way around. Vivendi owns Activision.

And I agree. Blizzard is made of grownups, people. They can make decisions you don't like on their own. Bobby Kotick doesn't have to always be an evil puppetmaster.

Azure Sky:[quote="Xzi" post="6.304349.12206091"]Sigh... Did ANY of you read/listen to any of the reasons why they did it?

This.

Players shouldn't be saddled with an unplayable character in the mid to late game (how many players gave up transitioning from normal to nightmare, for example?) because they didn't plan precisely how to spend all the skill points they would acquire from the moment they began the game. It's unreasonable to expect players to understand how all the skills are going to play based only on how they are described.

Yes, some people are going to grind through fifty playthroughs to hone their build, but there are plenty of others who will play once, or a small handful of times, and shouldn't be denied the opportunity to properly experience the gameplay for the whole amount of time they choose to play.

(By the way, if you guys really want to be cynics you should complain about this shift to advanced-build-customisation-through-runes in the context of the introduction of the real money store, given that runes will presumably be tradeable.)

Hammeroj:it doesn't reflect on your level of intelligence all that positively.

Oh an Insult. Well at least you pulled it off before the very end.

Hey, it's much less thinly veiled than "fucking morons" and comes with the condition "if this is the best you can do". An insult can hardly get any more fair than that.

Hammeroj:1. Is information that is released about any given game not to be judged? Is everyone supposed to like it or fuck off?

It is to be judged, the point I was TRYING to make (which I cleared up a lot in my second post on the thread if you would have scrolled down) was that don't say the game will absolutely suck (Not opinion, fact as many people make it, much like saying "WoW Sucks!" or "CoD is Stupid!" Instead of the better way of saying "I don't think WoW is all that good". They make it seem like an absolute fact.) especially when you, the poster has not even tried the game. (Poster as in whoever says it in that regard)

In layman's terms: If you haven't tried it don't say with absolute fact that it will suck.

Read those as opinions then. Unless the person specifically says this is objectively bad on this, this and this level, they usually don't mean it as fact.

Unless the promotional material and the news on any given game don't reflect the truth, the players are perfectly reasonable to base their purchase (or lack thereof) of the game on a specific feature they see as being advertised or otherwise getting out in the open.

As a side note, sometimes you don't need to taste shit to know it's shit.

Now on to point two... sorta:

Hammeroj: 2. Is "they hate it 'cause it's popular" the best thing you could come up with? Because if it is, I have to say, it doesn't reflect on your level of intelligence all that positively. And neither do the uncalled for insults, by the way.

The "Popular" was merely a Jest, if you payed any attention to the Escapist community, you would have noticed that CoD and WoW are mainly hated because it is "Popular" (Please note the Quotation marks). It was simply a jest, why you must take it seriously is beyond me.

And then you insult me, you were oh so close to actually making me care about your post, however the insult was rather unwarranted.

Again, bottom of page 1. Read it.

Now this may be me being thick, but I honestly don't understand what you're trying to say. The quotation things are really confusing me here. Are people hating on CoD and WoW simply because they're popular or are they not? If so, are you implying that the hate on Diablo (or Blizzard in general) is the exact same thing?

It's only an insult if you were dead serious about what I quoted in that particular case, in which case you might very well deserve it, but I have a suspicion you don't, hence the "if" condition.

I'd like to post something meaningful to contribute to the discussion on the pros and cons of Blizzards various choices (some I understand, others make me sadfaced), but I can't help but unconditionally love Diablo 3. I had so much fun with Diablo 2 that I almost feel like I have to at least try Diablo 3 before I condemn it.

The more I hear about D3 the more I'm certain I won't buy it. I'm glad the author of the article can overlook the fundementally flawed decisions surrounding this game (like region locking) but I simply cannot. They are deal breakers for me.

I was considering getting Diablo III, until the news about the constant connection DRM and lack of mods came out. Now I'm not even thinking about it! I shouldn't need an internet connection for offline play! Seriously, if they want to take away mods then why even have it on the PC?!...the auction house is kind of a cool idea though.

Project_Xii:I hope all rage and "preorder" cancelling keeps going until release. By then, the player base will be refined down to a nice, pleasent bunch of people who don't give a crap about all the meaningless things everyone else is getting their knickers in a twist over, and will just want to have fun playing the game solo or with other people. The less whiners the better.

While I agree with that, I do hope that a major wave of cancelling preorders and a hopefully slow start in sales would occure. That might motivate them to implement some changes that the majority of players call for.

From the interview, I like how the skill system is supposed to work. I liked the Guild Wars style of "only so many skills at once", and beeing able to change the way skills work through runes sounds really fun and, dare I say it, innovative.

Players shouldn't be saddled with an unplayable character in the mid to late game (how many players gave up transitioning from normal to nightmare, for example?) because they didn't plan precisely how to spend all the skill points they would acquire from the moment they began the game. It's unreasonable to expect players to understand how all the skills are going to play based only on how they are described.

Yes, some people are going to grind through fifty playthroughs to hone their build, but there are plenty of others who will play once, or a small handful of times, and shouldn't be denied the opportunity to properly experience the gameplay for the whole amount of time they choose to play.

(By the way, if you guys really want to be cynics you should complain about this shift to advanced-build-customisation-through-runes in the context of the introduction of the real money store, given that runes will presumably be tradeable.)

Mhm, I remember my Orb-sorc vividly enough.

I also remember having NOTHING BUT FKN COLD BOLT till level 30... =(

Or even a Hamm0rdin/Avenger, Those had even less offensive power pre 18/24 respectively.